CHENNAI: Not many would ever imagine that a small boy, all of just seven years old, watching his idol Viswanathan Anand play a World Chess Championship match in his home city against Magnus Carlsen, would go on to be mentored by his idol and eventually become the youngest World Champion. This is the stuff dreams are made of. But D Gukesh did not just dream, he turned his dreams into reality.
Just like his mentor Anand, Gukesh too sparked a new revolution in chess after defeating Ding Liren in the World Championship match in Singapore. “I have been dreaming about this, and living this moment since I was six or seven. Every chess player wants to live this moment and to be one of them is...the only way to express it: I’m living my dream,” said Gukesh upon winning the world title.
In the World Championship bout, game 14 was heading for a draw with the prospects of tie-breaks, but Ding made a shocking blunder in the 55th move, which Gukesh took full advantage of. “When I realised that, it was probably the best moment of my life,” the Chennai-based player said.
After Anand lost the world crown to Carlsen in Chennai in 2013, no one thought about an Indian winning the world title again. The likes of K Sasikiran and P Harikrishna were solid players and could upset the best on a given day, but were never in contention to win a world crown in the classical format.
“When I was watching the match (Anand vs Carlsen) in 2013, looking into the glass box, I thought it’d be so cool to be there one day. When Magnus won, I thought I really wanted to be the one to bring back the title. Doing it for me, my loved ones and my country, there’s nothing better.”
Gukesh’s rise can be attributed to the excellent domestic infrastructure for chess in Tamil Nadu. Former FIDE vice-president DV Sundar, when he was part of the administration of the All India Chess Federation (AICF) and Tamil Nadu State Chess Association, set up a system whereby players got to play a lot of age group tournaments at the state, national and international level.
Also, during the last decade or so, several Grandmasters took up coaching while still being active players. Some even set up professional coaching academies. GM RB Ramesh, GM Vishnu Prasanna, GM Srinath N — all took up coaching, with Vishnu Prasanna and Srinath coaching while playing in tournaments.
Gukesh started playing chess when he was about seven. He won the U-9 title in the Asian Schools Chess Championship in 2015. He became an International Master (IM) in 2017 and the very next year, he won the World U-12 Chess Championship. Again in 2018, he won multiple gold medals in the Asian U-12 Chess Championship. In 2019, he became the second youngest GM at the time (12 years, 7 months & 17 days).
‘’Becoming a GM is always special. This will propel me to work hard and go up the ladder,’’ Gukesh had said at the time. Gukesh’s former coach and current mentor Vishnu Prasanna credited his student’s calm mind as one of the main reasons for his success. “Gukesh’s understanding of the game is very good. He can grasp things easily and has a calm and composed mind,’’ Prasanna had said when Gukesh became a GM. Another major boost for Gukesh in his career was being a student at the WestBridge Anand Chess Academy (WACA). Here, he got to train with Anand and also got an opportunity to train with Grzegorz Gajewski.
This association led Gukesh to perform brilliantly in the Candidates and win it to challenge Ding Liren for the world title. After the win at the Chess Olympiad in Budapest, Hungary, where Gukesh was in sublime form, (Team and Individual), it was clear that he would put up a good fight at the World Chess Championship in Singapore.
‘’It was good to win gold at the Chess Olympiad. It was teamwork that led us (Team India) to excel. I am not thinking about the World Championship now. Will start preparations shortly,’’ Gukesh had said after his brilliant show at the Olympiad.
GM Srinath N, coach of the India Chess Olympiad team, was all praise for Gukesh. “Gukesh was absolutely brilliant at the Olympiad. He played positively, was accurate in his calculations, played with a lot of confidence and was able to outsmart his opponents with some innovative moves,’’ Srinath had said.
Not a cakewalk
Coming to the World Chess bout, everyone predicted that it would be a cakewalk for Gukesh, as Ding was not at his best in the classical format. Some critics also suggested that Ding underperformed deliberately. But Gukesh had an interesting take on this subject.
“Anyone who understands high-level sports, it’s clear that if you play 13 games at a high-level, in high-intensity, prepare for six months and if you come for the last game at a World Championship, you are pretty much dead at that point. We are basically two dead people playing chess and mistakes happen in those moments,” Gukesh said. Gukesh had also displayed his ability to handle setbacks during the World Championship, having lost the 12th game. “It was quite tough, but I was still confident that I could pull through,” he recalled.
After the World Championship win, Gukesh took part in Freestyle chess. It was his tournament after winning the world crown.
While there were huge expectations from Gukesh, he put up a poor performance, finishing the campaign without a single win in the tournament. Alireza Firouzja dominated the seventh-place playoff, defeating Gukesh in 30 moves.
Gukesh finished last after losing to Iranian-French Grandmaster Firouzja in the second game of their seventh-place playoff match. Gukesh thus concluded his forgettable campaign in the tournament in Germany without a single win. This performance made World No. 1 Magnus Carlsen comment that Gukesh ‘’needs to improve a lot in rapid and blitz.’’